


Runs in the Family

by z0mbyez



Category: Minecraft (Video Game), Video Blogging RPF
Genre: Bad Parent Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Broken Bones, Character Study, Daddy Issues, Dream Team SMP Roleplay (Video Blogging RPF), Insane Wilbur Soot, Mental Breakdown, Mentioned Phil Watson (Video Blogging RPF), Mentioned Technoblade (Video Blogging RPF), Mentioned TommyInnit (Video Blogging RPF), Pre-Manberg-Pogtopia War on Dream Team SMP (Video Blogging RPF), Sad Wilbur Soot, Self-Harm, Self-Hatred, Wilbur Soot Has Daddy Issues
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-03-13
Updated: 2021-03-13
Packaged: 2021-03-20 18:35:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,479
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/30009192
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/z0mbyez/pseuds/z0mbyez
Summary: Internally, Wilbur Soot crumbles like his broken bones. He crumbles to the pain of his hand, the clawing hands of his failures, the desperate grasps from the dark depths of his brain. The depths that always assured him that no matter what happened, he would never be good enough. Not for himself, not for his father.
Relationships: No Romantic Relationship(s)
Kudos: 26





	Runs in the Family

**Author's Note:**

> This is my first fic- please be kind! I would love to write more one-shots in the future as I love the dream smp and its characters, but I'm not typically a writer, and am a student. Any thoughts/critiques on the work I would love to hear !! Please enjoy <3
> 
> Title from "Runs in the Family" by Amanda Palmer

_ Dad, _

~~_ Things are successful over on the SMP _ ~~

~~_ Tommy and I are doing well _ ~~

~~_ L’manberg is finally at peace _ ~~

~~_ I won the election in a landslide _ ~~

~~_ I’m finally finding my place _ ~~

Wilbur lets out an angry huff, slamming his hands down on the messily-crafted wooden table. The flame of a candle wavers dangerously with the force, the books stacked to a side shaking with the sudden movement. Letting out a string of curses, he shoves the parchment and ink off of the desk, the glass bottle of ink shattering upon impact. Pressing the palms of his hands into his eyes Wilbur growls, letting more curses go with each breath. 

Nothing was right, nothing sounded  _ right _ . Nothing he could say anymore would be worth mentioning to his father, no part of his bullshit  _ failures _ would be worth relaying to anyone at all. Nothing the man did would be worth sharing, would ever be worth showing to the light of day. There was no saving this, no making up for this  _ bullshit _ election loss, and subsequent exile, of all things. 

A string of losses, all brought upon himself. Amateur decisions. Rookie mistakes.  _ Failures. _

Wilbur lets out a low groan, tugging a hand angrily through his brown curls before pulling it down his face. That’s all he was anymore, wasn’t it? A failure. Son of one of the most powerful men in a millenia, and he couldn’t even rule a country. A bullshit, tiny little country, something he had- quite literally- built from the ground up. It was practically handed to him on a silver platter, and he had fucked it over again and again and  _ again. _ Every time! Without mistake, he damned any plan to kingdom come with his own stupid ideas. 

He resisted the urge to punch a wall. Broken fingers would help no one, he muttered to himself. 

Instead he moves to pacing the cold ravine floor, the tattered coat sweeping in each direction as he turns. The rest of Pogtopia is silent, Techno out doing who-knows-what, Tommy doing something God knows where, generally being a menace. The heavy footsteps were the only sound that echoed through the long chamber, Wilbur bearing to be the only witness. The man paced fast and aggressive, hands clenching and unclenching at his sides, his mouth set in a firm line. He was tired of the failures. He was tired of his own incompetence. He was tired of his bullshit, extraordinary older “brother”. He was tired of being lesser. He was  _ Tired _ . Tired of himself in every way. 

Pacing quicker and quicker, the rage built inside of Wilbur until it threatened to boil over. Glass crackled under each heavy footfall, shattering into smaller pieces every step. Mentally his brain churned with stormy waters, reflecting back on every way his life had gone wrong. Every tiny, minute thing that had turned his life into the disaster it was now, every bad decision that had pushed his father further away, further into the arms of someone that wasn’t even his fucking son. Every mistake that had made him run away from the cabin to try and finally,  _ finally,  _ do something good in the eyes of his family. Muscles trembling with pent-up emotion, Wilbur lets out a primal scream, and gives in to his original urge. His fist lets out an ugly crack upon impact with the wall, and his knuckles come away bloody from the stone, a furious red. He lets out another scream, a mixture of frustration and pain. His legs tremble but remain steady; Instead he leans against the wall, forehead touching cold stone, he takes shaky breaths, before placing his hand once again on the ravine wall and giving it another punch.

This one leaves his hand throbbing even more angrily than before, his mouth almost letting out a scream, but he refuses to let it escape. Wilbur punches again, and again, and again, sobs escaping his mouth with each new attack. Shakily he falls to the ground when he can no longer bear to hit the wall, tears running down his face as the blood drips slowly from his knuckles.

Internally, Wilbur Soot crumbles like his broken bones. He crumbles to the pain of his hand, the clawing hands of his failures, the desperate grasps from the dark depths of his brain. The depths that always assured him that no matter what happened, he would never be good enough. Not for himself, not for his father. 

Falling backwards onto the glass-covered ground, Wilbur lets the sobs rip out of his body with each throb of his broken hand. As he lets everything settle, Wilbur allows the hot cries to escape him, tears streaking down his cheeks until his eyes run empty. He stares up, up at the flickering torchlight, letting out choked breaths until they run shaky, and later steady. Minutes or hours- he couldn’t tell-, he lays still on the ground, glass shards cutting through his coat into the skin of his back. He clenches and unclenches his broken hand, staring into nothing, mind cycling through all of his angry thoughts. Angry at himself for getting into this, angry at the world for making him resort to it. Angry at his father for never showing him the love he deserved, leading him to all of this in the first place

Wilbur lays there for a long time. The torches burn low, shadows growing larger on the ravine walls. He lays silent and still as a corpse, mind churning like an angry beast. 

_ “Now,” _ Wilbur thinks as he stares at the ceiling,

_ “Now I don’t care anymore.” _

Out of nowhere he lets out a laugh, grasping the wrist of his broken hand to steady it with each rise and fall of his chest. 

“I don’t care anymore!” 

He yelled to the empty ravine, a smile evident even in his voice. More laughter bubbles out of him, each shake of his ribs making him grab his broken hand in pain. He ignored this- he deserved it after all, didn’t he?

The laughter turned hysteric, rolling from side to side as the breaths wheezed out of him one after the other. Wilbur sat up, still shaking with every sound that escaped him, rising to his feet as he lashed his arms out in proclamation.

“I don’t care anymore!” he yelled to the empty chamber, a wide grin etched deep into his features in the dim light.

“I! Don’t! Care! Anymore!” He yelled it again to no one, emphasizing each word with a brandish of his arms. The pain in his hand was ignored, the blood dripping into the floor similarly left unseen. Running his good hand through his hair Wilbur whipped off his beanie and threw it into the air, catching it as it came down with a hearty woop. Pulling it back on, he walked to the abandoned pile of scrapped letters, and took them briskly to the desk. 

Systematically, with each letter getting its own turn, Wilbur burned the letters. He watched as each disintegrated into nothing, each failed attempt of faking a happy tone to his father smoking out of existence and mixing into the dusty air. Wilbur watched each intently, letting out gleeful chuckles as the candle flame swelled with each destroyed piece of parchment. As each one burned he felt lighter, as though his lungs were finally filling, like he was finally getting the praise and attention he had never gotten in his youth. 

_ “Destruction” _ , he decided, 

_ “Destruction is what we can be good at.” _

He thought it silently, the wide grin turning into a small, relieved smile as he went. 

If nothing he did was correct, then he could simply destroy the failures. If nothing remained to show he messed up in the first place, then there was no way to say he wasn’t good, right? It was fool proof. Finally, he would be perfect. The perfect son his father always wanted, the perfect man he had always wanted to be but never had been. And he would be in control of the entire process, no room for a middle man to fuck it up. 

As he finished burning the letters, Wilbur snuffed the candle, realigned the shifted books. He washed and wrapped his hand, vowing to properly splint the bones later. He cleaned the destroyed ink bottle from the floor, sweeping up the glass and scrubbing the stains. He washed the dried blood from the wall, replaced the now barely-lit torches on the walls. Wilbur made sure it looked as though he had never been there, as though nothing out of the ordinary had never happened. 

Wilbur put everything in its proper place, and then he left; left to find the only man who would be able to help him make the world perfect. Wilbur left Pogtopia, mounted his horse, and rode off to find Dream. 


End file.
